The 10th Annual XL Bermuda Youth ConferenceLast week on March 27th and 28th Global Arts Foundation hosted their annual conference at the XL headquarters.Eighty students from eight seniors schools on island attended The tenth annual XL Bermuda Youth Conference.The students represented: The Berkeley Institute, CedarBridge Academy, Mount St. Agnes, The Bermuda Institute, Bermuda High School for Girls, Saltus, Somersfield Academy and Warwick Academy.In addition to the Bermudian students, ten students from The University of Hartford Barney School of Business attended the Conference.Upon arrival the students were put in to five teams.The teams were made up of a minimum of one senior school student from each school together with one University student as their Group Leader.A sixth team was made up of solely four University students.The Annual XL Bermuda Youth Conference is a follow-up conference to The United Nations International School Conference which Global Arts Foundation has been taking a delegation to for the past ten years.This year the subject matter at the UN was “Youth Quake — An Impact of a Generation.”In years past national community healing programmes have been designed and launched by the youth at the Bermuda Youth Conference.For example: Youth News.com a newspaper written by students; a community health programme: The National Inter School Fitness Challenge and a Global Rainwater Harvesting Campaign to name but a few.This year the subject of the conference focused on the youth in our community designing a platform which would in turn give the youth a formal voice in our community.The team’s challenges over the two days were to design a national platform for the student body of Bermuda to have a voice in social, economic and political issues in the country.The groups gave presentations to local and international businessmen at the Conference.They were put directly on the spot in presentations when they delivered their business plans.On day two the teams were judged by a Panel of Judges: Victoria Clipper (Tokio Millennium); Patrick Bean; Joanne Pulley (Partner Re); DelMonte Davis (The Royal Gazette); Margaret Giloth (Department of Youth & Sport).The conference was overseen by Sarah Fellows (Global Arts Foundation) and Annette Rogers (The Barney School of Business). The management team included: Nolette Tucker, Claire Cook and Disa Potgieter Oubella.The teams were judged on their mission statement; marketing strategy; infrastructure; funding; media; staffing; accountability; budget and presentation technique.The winning team at the XL tenth Annual Bermuda Youth Conference was: Lauren de Verteuil (Warwick Academy); Zarena Lindsay (Bermuda Institute); Ryan Robinson (The Berkeley Institute); Chrisante Bean (CedarBridge Academy); Nathan Burgess (MSA); Tariq Basden (Bermuda Institute); Rodneyka Freeman (CedarBridge Academy); Starr Wilson (Bermuda Institute).The university student that lead the winning team was: Brenton Adelson from The University of Hartford Barney School of Business.Mr Phillips, CEO of Global Arts Entertainment said about the conference: “Teaching the youth to work, think and live as one team, one leading strength unit … will continue to gain undeniable power … by demonstrating the true effectiveness of peace, love and unity.”The winning team together with 20 students have agreed to meet up after the conference to ensure their Bermuda Youth Association is put into action and ready to launch for the school year in September 2013.The team will meet on a weekly basis between now and then to accomplish this task.Minister of Education Nalton Bragman also attended the conference to wish the children all the best over the two day conference.In addition Marva Phillips gave an inspirational speech at the conference based upon her involvement within The Progressive Group which was behind the 1959 Theatre Boycott which led to the desegregation of the theatres and eventually all public facilities.The winning individual at the conference was Rodneyka Freeman.Rodneyka wins a trip to represent Bermuda at The United Nations International School Conference in March 2014. Rodneyka was also a member of the winning team.Each of the students were marked by their team leaders on their leadership skills and work ethics during the two days of the conference.In addition the students were offered the opportunity to complete bonus homework and write about one of the three key areas the youth feel are concerns in our community:n An honest and responsive Governmentn Freedom and discriminationn Better job opportunities